I haven't squirmed like this since I
watched my fiancée get laser eye surgery.

The Red Sox don't "play" defense, they
"fight" defense. I'm still trying to figure out which of today's throws to
the plate was most nauseating: Johnny Damon's embarrassing fling from
shallow center, Nomar's almost physically impossible misfire from shallow
left or Shea Hillenbrand's gack from 70 feet away. Sure, the bullpen has
been a disaster, but that could be largely solved with one deadline
acquisition. The team's wretched defense and organization-wide disregard
for its importance will plague the Sox this season and beyond. And don't
be fooled by fielding percentage. While the Sox made a bunch of errors in
dropping this weekend's series, it's the balls they don't get to, the DPs
they don't turn and the cutoff men they miss that kill them.

Where to begin? Well, since we
embarrassed ourselves against the Twins, let's start with our twins: David
Ortiz and Jeremy Giambi.

Ortiz and Giambi are clones
offensively. Ortiz has a career .264 batting average with an .805 career
OPS and Giambi has an identical .264 BA and an .809 OPS. They are
both incredibly slow and yet in their brief time with the Sox both have
hit the ball on the ground more than in the air. But the real similarity
is on defense, where both are zeroes. I watched a spring training game in
which Ortiz looked lost on a bunt popped in front of him, let another
popup land right behind him and butchered a routine ground ball. No range,
no instincts, no hands. What does it say that Grady Little believes Giambi
is worse? And why would you need both these players on your roster? Do we
really need to do more research on the October effectiveness of
stockpiling slow, stone-gloved DH-types? These guys are the poster
children for not caring about defense. Can you imagine how quickly the
bile would fill your throat on a difficult chopper hit to Ortiz's right in
a close playoff game?

What about new acquisitions Todd
Walker and Kevin Millar? I love their approach at the plate, but, again,
they are significantly below average defensively. Walker's range
limitations are well-documented, his pivot is less than slick, his arm
unimpressive and his hands none too soft.

Millar is a gamer, a terrific hitter
and clearly a wonderful teammate. I love this guy. But without a bat
in his hand, he's hurting the team. For some reason he was playing first
in the bottom of the ninth with a one-run lead in Anaheim last weekend -
perhaps Grady forgot that he had dubbed Shea our late-inning defensive
first baseman. Millar charged a ball he should have waited on, turned it
into an in-between hop and booted it. It wasn't that he made an error --
everyone does -- it was the way he booted it that was so depressing. In
that moment, your suspicions were confirmed. Our new favorite player is
basically another DH.

Against the Twins Friday night Millar
had three misplays that were not errors, the most embarrassing of which
was being several feet from the bag as he tried to complete a routine
3-6-3 double play. The ball finds your weak defenders. And on this team,
how can it not?

Today, the Sox created one of the
largest Bermuda triangles in Major League history by starting Millar in
right with Ortiz at first, leaving second baseman Bill Mueller responsible
for all the acreage between the two thick-wasted statues. If you remember,
though you can be excused for trying to forget, all the trouble started on
a pop fly by Dustin Mohr down the right-field line with the Sox leading
4-0. Mueller made a solid effort in trying to reach the ball, but Millar
and Ortiz weren't even in the picture when the ball plunked down in fair
territory. Captain Ahab and Peter Stuyvesant would cover more ground than
this seemingly peg-legged duo.

While we're out there, let's talk
about our regular rightfielder. Trot Nixon tries his hardest on every
play. It is very hard to fault a guy for this. But here goes. Most of
Trot's defensive mistakes stem from his consuming desire. Even though his
arm is not in the Ichiro-Vlad class, he wants to throw everyone out, no
matter if the guy is already three-quarters of the way home as the ball
reaches him. This leads to his chronic airmailing of the cutoff man. How
many times has a runner moved up into scoring position under the comical
parabola of one of Trot's rainbows? But perhaps the best example to date
of Trot's desire hurting the team came last week against Kansas City. With
two outs and nobody on, Carlos Beltran hit a sinking line drive at
Trot. Base hit all the way. But valor always being the better part of
discretion for Trot, he made a ridiculous dive for the ball, failed to get
a glove on it and had the ball bounce over him for an inside-the-park home
run. It reminded me of Mike Greenwell's "bad hustle," the kind of
unthinking effort that announcers usually excuse with the lame "you can't
fault a guy for hustling like that." Guess what? You can. You
should. Dumb plays are dumb plays. With the winning run on third, you dive
for that ball. With two outs and nobody on in a scoreless game, you take
it on a hop.

And why does Johnny Damon look like
he's throwing with his off hand? This is the throwing motion my mom uses
to toss the football around with her grandson. Seriously, can a guy have
this weak an arm in the Major Leagues? He would have the third-strongest
outfield arm on my softball team. (I'm not kidding.) In today's debacle,
the less-than-speedy Corey Koskie tagged and scored on a 200-foot pop fly
to center. I actually thought Damon's throw might come to rest before it
reached home plate. The worst part is that even Johnny was apparently
surprised that someone would try to score on such a shallow pop, so
instead of gathering behind the ball and catching it in mid-crow-hop, he
caught it flat-footed before starting his arthritic, herky-jerky throwing
motion.

Which brings us to today's other two
nominees for most humiliating imitation of an adult male throwing a
baseball.

For the second time this season --
anyone remember Pedro's lone unearned run in the Opening Day calamity? --
Shea Hillenbrand failed to throw a guy out at the plate when he could have
beaten the runner by rolling the ball home. But, in fairness, Shea
continues to improve at the hot corner, and if he plays a couple games at
first each week, I'll bet he doesn't even lead the league in errors by a
third baseman for the second straight year.

Nomar, however, made a strong
statement Friday night that he won't give up the American League Error
Crown he won last year without a fight. After leading the league with 25
E's last season, Nomar doubled his early-season total with three E-6's in
Friday's loss to the Twins. Somehow he avoided another error today when
the official scorer awarded Michael Cuddyer a triple -- on a ball into the
left-field corner? -- after Nomar made one of his classic Bend It Like
Beckham throws, oh, 30 feet off target in the direction of home plate. The
sad thing is that all three runners would have been out at home with the
simplest C+ throws.

So let's sum up:

The Red Sox left side each led their
position in errors last year. The Red Sox new right side is a significant
downgrade from last year and perhaps the worst in the American League. The
centerfielder can't throw. This team was built for 12-9 games in July.

The “Curt’s Pitch
for ALS” program is a joint effort by Curt and Shonda Schilling, and The
ALS Association Mass Chapter to strike out Amyotrophic Lateral
Sclerosis, more commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease.

Curt and Shonda
will be contributing $25,000 to The ALS Association Massachusetts
Chapter, and they are asking fans to contribute as well. All proceeds
will benefit research and patient services for those in Massachusetts
affected by the disease. Program participants will receive different
incentive prizes based on the dollar amount per strikeout that they
pledge.
Please
click here to learn more about the program.